The Fear in Her Eyes

by Grant McKenzie

  “How do you get them?”

  “I … I …”

  Ian pressed the toe of his shoe into the man’s kidney. Colfleet squeaked in fright.

  “I rent them,” he said hurriedly. “But I give them straight back after.”

  Ian pinched the bridge of his nose, not wanting to believe that, if Darwin was correct, somewhere far down the line of evolution he shared a common ancestry with this despicable beast.

  “When the police come to arrest you,” Ian said, “I want you to give them the names of everyone you rented children from. No plea bargain. No deals. Just give them the names.”

  Colfleet paled. “Why would I do that?”

  “Because you do not want to know what I’ll do to you if you don’t.”

  “What gives you the right to threaten me?”

  Ian’s voice was ice. “I’m a father.”

  Colfleet peered into Ian’s eyes and shrank beneath the threat of something that held more terror than the violence he had already endured.

  18

  Ian called the police and left an anonymous tip that a fugitive they were after was hiding behind Bunions diner. He didn’t mention that there was no need to hurry. Bernard Colfleet’s hands were securely fastened to the remains of the old Ford truck by means of police-style plastic ties that Ian kept in the glove box. Until today, he had only ever used them to keep his amp and speaker cables in check.

  After parking a discreet distance down the block to keep watch, Ian slipped out his phone again. His finger hesitated over the screen, but he didn’t have a choice. He needed help.

  Jersey picked up on the first ring. He didn’t even give Ian a chance to say the first word. “I’m ankle-deep in blood here, and a witness is telling me your fingerprints are all over this. Where the hell are you?”

  “Nearby. I—

  “Did you use me to get to this guy?” Jersey was yelling. Pure anger and venom. “Did you make me a fucking accomplice in a revenge kill?”

  “I didn’t kill him,” Ian said back.

  “That’s not what—

  A sudden thought. “Check the knife! I never touched the knife. I heard the scream and ran upstairs. Hogg was already dying. I knelt in the blood and tried to talk to him. My prints may be on his face, but not the knife.” Ian took a deep breath to control his panic. “Why would I kill him? With Young dead, he was the only lead I had.”

  “Why did you run?” Jersey’s voice had calmed, but it still held a honed edge of distrust.

  “I was chasing the killer. The real killer.”

  “And who was that?”

  “I never saw his face.”

  “My witness didn’t see anyone but you.”

  “Then who made him scream?” asked Ian. “Your toothless witness heard that. I had to run up three flights of stairs. I’m not the fucking Flash.”

  “You need to turn yourself in.”

  “I will, but first I need you to do something for me.”

  “Don’t push your luck,” Jersey warned.

  “I think the killer was driving a vintage Dodge Super Bee. Yellow and black. Two-door coupe. I would guess a ’69.”

  “Subtle.”

  “It worked.” Ian sighed in disgust at himself. “I noticed the car, but never looked at the driver.”

  “Catch the plate?”

  “No, but there can’t be too many of them in the state. This one is in great shape, too. Somebody takes care of it. Babies it.”

  “I’ll look into it,” said Jersey. “But Ian, until you turn yourself in, don’t call me again.”

  He hung up.

  IAN’S NEXT call was to Linda McCabe at Children First. It went straight to voicemail, so Ian hung up and phoned her personal line.

  Still living at home, Jeannie answered just as she did at the office, but with all that had been happening, her chipper tone stung like salt in a fresh wound.

  “Hey, Ian, you enjoying the weekend?”

  “No. Is she in?”

  “Oh!” Jeannie was taken aback by his abruptness. “Hold on.”

  Despite a twinge of regret for his tone, Ian refused to feel bad. Even if his clothes hadn’t been caked in the blood of strangers, Molly was still missing. Jeannie should know better.

  Linda came on the line. Her tone was clipped, obviously annoyed at her daughter’s feelings having been hurt.

  “I might need bail money,” said Ian without preamble. “How are we fixed?” By “we” he meant Children First. As a silent partner, he didn’t pay much attention to the financial details of the company. Not because he didn’t care, but because he knew that in a cage fight of intellectual prowess, Linda made Ultimate Fighting look like a playground tussle.

  Linda’s annoyance dissolved into concern. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine. It’s just a misunderstanding, but a messy one.”

  “Molly?”

  “No. It concerns Emily.”

  An intake of breath was quickly capped beneath a tight lid of control. “Do you need to talk?”

  “At some point, but not now. I just need to know that I can post bail if necessary. I can’t be off the streets.”

  “I know a good bondsman,” said Linda. “I’ll make a call and assure him that we can put up the deposit.”

  “Thanks.”

  “And when you’re ready to talk,” Linda added, “I’m here.”

  THE POLICE arrived at Bunions diner. Two uniforms, looking bored, obviously believing someone was wasting police time. The shorter of the two entered the diner, talked to the ponytailed waitress, and returned to the patrol car. His face said it all: Told you so.

  The taller picked up the radio and called dispatch for a clarification. When he finished, he pointed to the alley.

  A few minutes later, the officers reappeared with Bernard Colfleet in handcuffs between them. The predator was jabbering away at a thousand words per minute, but neither officer appeared to be listening. He was still in midsentence when the tall cop placed a hand on top of his shaved head and forcefully guided him into the cruiser’s rear seat.

  After slamming the door closed, the tall officer flipped a coin, grinned at the short one, and stabbed his thumb toward the diner. The short one rolled his eyes and headed inside. A minute later, he returned to the car with a pair of coffees and two doughnuts. The cops chatted as they ate their snack, blatantly tuning out whatever their prisoner had to say.

  IAN RETURNED to his phone and scrolled through the history of incoming calls. When he found Helena’s new number, he dialed.

  “Helena Fairchild.” She sounded annoyed, distracted. “Who’s calling, please?” Her phone’s caller ID didn’t recognize his number.

  “You don’t have me in your contact list anymore?”

  “New phone, Ian.”

  He could hear the unspoken words: New phone. New life. Grow up. Easier said than done.

  “I need a lawyer. Know any good ones?”

  “That you can afford? No.”

  Ouch. Playtime was over.

  Helena sighed in a battle with her own irritability. “OK,” she relented. “What for?”

  Ian explained the situation up to the point where⎯

  “You fled the scene of a murder?” Helena was incredulous.

  “I had to,” Ian argued. “I received an urgent tip on another matter.”

  “You left a murder scene, Ian. It doesn’t get much worse than that.”

  “Sure it does,” said Ian. “I could have killed him.”

  “But you didn’t?”

  “Of course not. He was Young’s cellmate. The same man who delivered the note to me. I went to talk to him to find out if Young had told him anything more. It makes sense that Young would have shared the name of whoever hired him to kill our daughter with someone he trusted. That would be his insurance.”

  “So you’re saying that whoever planned to have Young killed in prison had to silence his cellmate to stop us from getting that name?”

  “Exac
tly.”

  “But what if Young’s death was a suicide?”

  “It wasn’t.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “If Young took his own life, he didn’t need insurance. And if he didn’t need insurance, then there was no reason to kill his cellmate. Hogg’s death proves that Young was murdered.”

  “You’re giving me a headache.”

  “That’s nothing new.”

  The airwaves turned cold, and Ian wished he could reach across and snatch back those unkind words. Spoken without thought, they were barbed just the same.

  “Sorry,” he said quickly. “I didn’t mean that.”

  “It’s fine.”

  It wasn’t. His words had sliced open a wound that scarred them both. Those days and weeks after Emily’s death had sent them both spiraling on a collision course where love just wasn’t enough to stop all the pain.

  Moving on. Hiding the hurt. “You want to turn yourself in?” Helena asked.

  “Yes. I need to get this cleared up quickly. I was hoping you could arrange it so that I can stay out on bail until the investigation is complete.”

  “Let me see what the DA’s office has to say and I’ll get back to you. Same number?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “I guess some things don’t change.”

  There was a moment of dead air and a noise that was either a muffled laugh or a repressed sob. Ian couldn’t tell which one it was before Helena disconnected.

  19

  The security guard eyed Ian suspiciously as he paced the deserted lobby of the Westside. Keeping the koi pond between them, the guard’s right thumb casually scratched at a spot on his belly. That seemingly harmless gesture allowed the palm of his hand to innocently rest on the butt of his firearm, while his dangling fingers played with the holster’s leather safety strap.

  “What’s that stuff on your pant legs?” asked the guard.

  “Blood.”

  “Yours?”

  “No.”

  A small spasm made the guard’s left eye twitch. His fingers tightened on the holster’s safety strap and made it pop open, snap closed, repeat.

  “That why you need a lawyer?” Droplets of perspiration beaded on the guard’s worm-like Clark Gable moustache. “On the weekend?”

  The guard’s nervousness pulled Ian out of his mental fog of churning, circular thought. He had arrived here on autopilot, barely aware of his surroundings, but viewing the scene through the guard’s distrustful eyes put the man’s fidgety trigger finger into perspective. The empty building was locked tight. Helen had phoned ahead to allow him special access, throwing off the guard’s normal weekend routine, which would likely be deciding whether to watch golf or football on the portable TV he kept beside the security monitors.

  Ian looked at himself in the glassy reflection of the fishpond and lifted a hand to finger-comb his wayward hair. An unexpected stab of pain made him stop: One knuckle was badly swollen and turning purple where it had clipped Colfleet’s eye socket. The other knuckles weren’t much better, scraped skin and flakes of dried blood. He looked at his other hand and released a weary sigh. These weren’t the hands of a musician—not anymore. The guard had every right to be twitchy.

  Before he could provide a calming measure of assurance, the elevator chimed and Helena stepped out. Perfect in a midcalf skirt and single-breasted jacket the color of burnished steel, she looked exactly like the kind of lawyer he couldn’t afford. Heck, who was he kidding—now that she was back in the good graces of her father, he couldn’t afford the polish on her shoes.

  Helena took one look at him and clucked her tongue in obvious exasperation. “Seriously? You’re going to turn yourself in to the police looking like this?”

  The guard, no doubt relieved to have fulfilled his duty, licked his lips and backed away to the safety of his desk.

  Ian held up his hands. “I didn’t want to hide anything. I didn’t do anything wrong.” He wrinkled his nose, briefly reconsidering. “Except leave the scene.”

  Helena’s frown deepened. “There’s being innocent and being proven innocent. We only care about the latter. And handing the DA your bloody clothes so he can put them on display in court is just plain stupid. Being married to a lawyer, I thought you would have known that.” She beckoned him to the elevator. “You need to get changed.”

  As Ian moved past her, Helena pointed a polished fingernail at the guard. Despite the distance across the lobby, the guard froze in place as though an assassin’s laser had just placed a red dot in the middle of his forehead.

  “You saw and heard nothing,” said Helena.

  The guard’s chin smacked his chest and bounced up to the ceiling in a blur of compliance.

  THE EIGHTEEN-story Portland Justice Center was home to not only the Portland Police Bureau but also four courtrooms and the maximum-security Multnomah County Detention Center. For criminals, that meant the journey from being arrested to incarcerated was a short one.

  Ian only hoped the same efficiency applied to getting back out.

  Dressed in a smart suit that was too large and far too expensive to be his own, and was in fact borrowed from the closet in Helena’s father’s corner office, Ian was read his rights, fingerprinted, photographed, and DNA swabbed. Jersey didn’t ride the elevator down from the fourteenth floor to make sure he was treated okay, and Helena vanished almost immediately to confer with the district attorney’s office.

  Ian tried to take the experience in stride. He had watched the process at least a dozen times when some of his juvenile clients went head-to-head with the police and didn’t know who else to call. No matter the hour and no matter how badly they had messed up, they all knew Ian would show up. He didn’t always arrive with a smile, but Ian made sure they weren’t alone and got in contact with the help they needed.

  Despite that experience, he hadn’t known just how unnerving the actual process could be. Just the thought of those skin cells from inside his cheek being catalogued alongside a multitude of evidence from brutal rapes and murders made his flesh crawl. He was part of that system now, reduced to a piece of data the computers would sift through every time something evil happened in the city, the country, even the world.

  “Holding cells are busy today,” said the uniformed officer who was processing him. In his midtwenties, he had shoulders that bespoke a college football scholarship and a stiffness in his walk that said he paid for his education in pain. “Judge has a full roster, so you’ll be sharing.”

  “That’s fine,” said Ian. “I don’t plan to stay lo—

  A Texan drawl interrupted. “Should have brought more doughnuts.”

  Ian turned to see the cowboy from the homicide division. The burly detective dropped some dog-eared folders in a plastic tray and winked across the room.

  “Told you to bring some decent coffee, too,” he said. “Doughnuts are only good for misdemeanors.”

  Despite himself, Ian found his grin. “Guess I forgot.”

  “Always next time.”

  As the detective walked away, the young officer looked at Ian in a new light. “You know Detective Preston?”

  “Sure,” Ian quipped. “We’re fans of the same bakery.”

  The officer looked impressed. “I’ll put you in the less crowded cell.”

  WHEN THE cell door closed, four sets of predatory eyes sized up the newcomer in the expensive but ill-fitting clothes. Three immediately dismissed him as nothing to be concerned with—just another bum in a gent’s hand-me-downs—but one pair of murky blue eyes, belonging to a man who was trying to be invisible, sitting alone and apart on the far corner of a too-short and uncomfortable bench, began blinking in terrified disbelief.

  Bernard Colfleet squeaked as he leapt to his feet and scanned the twelve-by-twelve cell for an exit that didn’t exist. “Stay away! I … I … I didn’t say anything about you.”

  “Well, I know that’s a lie.” Taking advantage of the unexpected surprise, Ian crossed the cell and pressed the b
ruised and swollen-cheeked predator into the corner beside the stainless steel toilet. “Your gums started flapping the moment the cops showed. I saw you.”

  “I peed red,” said Colfleet indignantly. “The nurse here says I may have cracked ribs.”

  “Ribs heal,” Ian hissed. “But what you broke inside those kids never will.”

  Colfleet licked his lips and tried to catch the attention of the other prisoners. None of them appeared interested in getting involved.

  Ian leaned in close. Colfleet smelled like sour apples with an underlying hint of wormy rot. “Do you want me to tell these fine but violence-prone gentlemen why you’re in this cell?”

  Colfleet’s eyes widened again as he rapidly shook his head from side to side.

  “Did you give up the names?”

  “I … I … gave them some,” Colfleet stammered.

  “That wasn’t the deal.”

  “I know, but—

  “You didn’t believe I could get to you no matter where you were, right?”

  Colfleet lowered his gaze and nodded. Despite his height advantage over Ian, he appeared small.

  “Now you know better,” said Ian. “Call the guard. Tell him you have more names to share.”

  After Ian backed off, Colfleet wiped his brow on the back of his hand and shuffled toward the cell door. Before he reached it, Ian decided to press his advantage.

  “One more thing.”

  Colfleet turned.

  “If you mention my involvement in any of this, I’ll make sure the next time you check the color of your piss, you’ll need to do it sitting down. Do I make myself clear?”

  Colfleet nodded in defeat before turning back around and calling for the guard.

  After the predator was escorted out of the cell, one of the remaining prisoners locked his sights on Ian. Like Colfleet, he had shaved his head to disguise a receding hairline, but the dash-line tattoo that circled his neck alongside the words cut here made him look much tougher. Also, scar tissue zigzagged the brow ridges of both eyes and his left ear appeared to have been used as a pit bull’s chew toy.